The Pigs Strike Again
by Leo the Tiger
Summary: The pigs of the Devotindos Empire, led by General Sweinhart, rage attacks on the kingdom of Zephyrus once again, which gets in the way of Howlzon, the new Lord of the Wolves (replacing the deceased Ulfgar the Merciless), who is trying to make a peace treaty with the king of Zephryus and his daughter, Princess Sherry. As always, it's Sparkster to the rescue!
**The Pigs Strike Again**

Yes, it was another typical turmoil for Zephyrus and its opossum population. The Devotindos Empire was at it again, and General Sweinhart was up to his old bag of tricks. It didn't help that the Gedol Empire was at war with them, though; it seemed there were a bunch of enemies all quarreling with one another just to be the one that would destroy the opossums and their king. But the Gedol Empire had been shot down in its prime just recently, and the pigs had previous fooled the opossums with their false alliance againt the Wolf Army and its leader, Ulfgar the Merciless.

The Zephyrian kingdom wasn't losing hope, however, for it had one bright shining light of hope and justice in the form of their secret weapon: Sparkster, the Rocket Knight. Time after time he had singlehandedly brought peace and tranquility to his country and to his world, and yet, you could only imagine how bad he felt, having been rejected by his own people when his king failed to heed his warnings about the pigs and Sweinhart's treaty being a fake. As a result, our hero had flown off, feeling he was no longer useful, only to return 15 years later when the army of wolves attacked. The pigs had been taking up residence in Zephyrus, only to revolt and turn on the opossums when all the wolves were defeated. Ulfgar had also resigned from his role as Lord of the Wolves, and upon his death, Howlzon (one of his trusted leaders) had became the Lord of the Wolves. (Howlzon had also turned the Wolf Empire around for the better, something he wanted to do all the time, but never got the chance to do so.)

And let us not forget Axel Gear, the corrupt Rocket Knight that rivaled Sparkster and wanted to do away with the hero himself. Speculation said he wanted the fame and glory but didn't get it, so he turned evil. But the real story was that he wanted all the power from stealing an ancient book containing all the secrets of the Rocket Knights, only to get caught in the act. Sparkster became the new leader upon Mifune Sanjulo's death (Axel Gear had severly wounded Sanjulo). Whatever was the case, he was always out to get Sparkster, so he was teaming up with all the villains he could. Somehow he managed to keep it hidden, because he had fooled the opossum population during Sparkster's 15-year absence into thinking he was the heroic Rocket Knight, and thus, he was hogging all the glory. Eventually the word got out on him, and his popularity plummeted. You can't keep a bad opossum down, though, and Axel kept his word to get his revenge on his rival.

In today's case, Axel was helping Sweinhart's troops attack the kingdom, and the soldiers were fighting back while the king was taking cover. Sparkster noticed this while trying to do some of his farm chores, so he donned his armor, got his sword and rocket pack ready, and blasted off to save the day again. All the while, he took notice of a surprise: the wolves were back, under the orders of Howlzon. But instead of siding with the pigs, the wolves were siding with the opossums. "That's a switch," Sparkster thought to himself as he began to fight, "but I hope it's not another trick. The pigs fooled my people and my king. Will the wolves do the same?"

"Impossible! You are supposed to be dead!" Sweinhart screamed as his troops attacked the wolves and opossums.

"No thanks to you, we are not!" Howlzon howled back. "The only one dead is Ulfgar! I am his successor, and I am turning our people in the opposite direction! We will hunt you down!"

The opossums cheered when they saw Sparkster flying to the rescue, and Axel groaned and growled as he donned his own armor and led the rebellion. While it was a team effort between the opossums and wolves, all the citizens could see was Sparkster defeating each enemy one by one. As before, the pigs were having to run away in humiliation after each defeat when Sparkster's special sword that could project energy over a short distance. Sweinhart didn't have a robot to assist him this time, so he just tried to fight Sparkster to the death, but to no avail. Bad idea; nobody ever beat Sparkster in a duel. He wasn't the leader of the Rocket Knights for nothing.

Eventually our hero's attention turned towards his rival when he saw Axel trying to kidnap Princess Sherry once again, and the king was having a panic attack. With one swift blast, Sparkster charged in and knocked Axel off balance. The two began to duel with one another, and the king and Sherry ran to hide, with Howlzon leading them to safety.

"But I thought you were fighting us before," said the king.

"We used to, but that was back when Ulfgar was Lord of the Wolves," Howlzon replied. "I am Howlzon, the new Lord, and I ordered my soldiers to turn over a new leaf or face my wrath. Amazingly, I discovered some of them had wanted to be on the side of justice the entire time, and that Ulfgar had brainwashed them against their will into doing his evil bidding."

"Where is he?"

"He's dead. I come in peace, as do my fellow wolves. But the pigs prevented us from making peace."

"Then we'll save that for later."

Meanwhile, the duel had carried outside, and all the trio could do was watch. With one last drill blast move, Sparkster reigned triumphant, and Axel fell to his defeat, though not his doom. The citizens cheered, and Sparkster gave one wave before blasting off into the skies. His victory was his reward, and he never wanted anything more. "What nobility, and worthy to be praised!" exclaimed the king as he waved goodbye. (By that point, all the pigs had been defeated, though they had absolutely no thoughts of surrendering just yet.)

The next day, Sparkster returned to the palace, in order to fulfill the king's wishes of hearing Howlzon's side of the story. "So all the time it was just you obeying him in order to save your own lives, then?" he commented.

"It was indeed," Howlzon nodded. "The difference between this case and the case with those pigs is that they fooled you into letting them move in so they could conquer you. All we want to do is form a peace treaty and alliance, and together we will send those pigs back to the pen."

"I still don't know if I can trust you," said the king. "You once attacked us. And as for you, Sparkster, I want to apologize for not listening to you all those years ago. I felt the pigs were being genuine, and my people and I weren't serious enough. We didn't notice how good we had it! We didn't notice how special you are to us! We're all very sorry about it! Will you give us another chance?"

"I thought I had forgiven you all those years ago," Sparkster replied, "but my answer is yes."

That afternoon, Howlzon and his soldiers made the announcement, able to prove they were being genuine about their peace treaty. The king's brass band helped reinforce this treaty, and the citizens did still feel uneasy about it considering what the wolves had did to them before. But the wolves won their trust. This came in handy, because the next day, they teammed with up the opossum forces (alongside Sparkster), and all together, they whomped the evil pigs again. And once again, Sparkster did his duty, and then flew off into the horizon with no reward accepted, leading the citizens to just cheer for him as he flew away.

That subsequent evening, the king and Princess Sherry invited Howlzon to dine with them so that they could hear more of his story.

THE END

 _Sparkster franchise © Konami_


End file.
